Scaling Down Living Large in a Smaller Space

by Decker, Marj; Culbertson, Judi; Booth, George

• ISBN13: 9781594860935
• ISBN10: 1594860939
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2005-03-02
• Publisher: Rodale Books

Summary

How to make more of less-the book that shows how to simplify your life, control clutter, and pare down your possessions for a move into smaller living quarters.There are plenty of anti-clutter experts around ready to exhort us to sort, store, and trash our belongings, but this is the first book to address the specific needs of people moving from a larger to a smaller space, or merging two (or more) people's possessions into a single abode.If you and your mate are about to swap your large, single-family house for a condo, or move your parents out of the family home of 40 years into an assisted-living center, where do you start? How do you decide what to take, what to leave behind, and what to do with your discards? What can you do to keep the move from seeming tinged with loss?Scaling Down not only offers terrific nuts-and-bolts strategies for paring down one's belongings to only the best and most meaningful items, but it also addresses the emotional aspects of streamlining-the complicated relationship we have with our "stuff." Countering the pervasive American prejudice that having less is a step down, the authors advance their concept of "living large wherever you are!"

Author Biography

JUDI CULBERTSON is a New York-based organizing/ decluttering expert who gives clutter-control seminars coast to coast. She is also the author of a decluttering newsletter, Traveling Light.

MARJ DECKER is the CEO of the Denver-based company Time Is Priceless, which specializes in helping people downsize.
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Table of Contents

Introduction	xi
part 1 THE CHALLENGE OF SCALING DOWN
How Did We Get Here?	2	(14)
I Need to Do This But . . .	16	(16)
part 2 THE CULPRITS
But Aunt Winnie Gave It to Me!	32	(14)
Collaring the Paper Tiger	46	(14)
The Tyranny of Collections	60	(10)
The Secret Life of Clothing	70	(22)
part 3 SPECIAL SITUATIONS
Clearing Out Your Family Home	92	(16)
Your Cuisinart or Mine?	108	(12)
Moving in a Hurry	120	(12)
part 4 SCALING DOWN STRATEGIES
The Saga of the Rain Bonnets	132	(8)
Finding Good Homes	140	(22)
``This Is Your Life!''	162	(8)
Shop Till You Drop . . . Out	170	(12)
How to Keep from Cluttering Your New Place	182	(12)
part 5 THE REWARDS OF LIVING LARGE
Starting a New Adventure	194	(12)
Using Your Space for You	206	(13)
Additional Sources	219	(1)
Bibliography	220	(2)
Index	222